of the dying
are dry, but well they knew that the heart of the man was weeping.

The Taleb came with the idea that Israel also was gone, for a rumour to
that effect had passed through the town. "El hamdu l'Illah!" he
cried, when he saw that Israel was still alive. But then he remembered
something, and whispered in the Mahdi's farther ear that a vast
concourse of Moors and Jews including his own vast fellowship was even
then coming out to bury Israel, thinking he was dead.

Israel overheard him and smiled. It seemed as if he laughed a little
also. "It will soon be true," he muttered under his breath, that came
so quick. And hardly had he spoken when a low deep sound came from the
distance. It was the funeral wail of Israel ben Oliel.

Nearer and nearer it came, and clearer and more clear. First a mighty
bass voice: "Allah Akbar!" Again another and another voice:
"Allah Akbar!" and then the long roar of a vast multitude:
"Al--l--lah-u-kabar!" Finally a slow melancholy wail, rising and falling
on the darkening air: "There is no God but God, and Mohammed is the
Prophet of God."

It was a solemn sound--nay, an awful one, with the man himself alive to
hear it.

O gratitude that is only a death-song! O fame that is only a funeral!

Israel listened and smiled again. "Ah, God is great!" he whispered; "God
is great!"

To ease his labouring chest a moment the Mahdi rose and stepped to
the door, and then in the distance he could descry the procession
approaching--a moving black shadow against the sky. Also over their
billowy heads he could see a red glow far away in the clouds. It was the
last smouldering of the fire of the modern Sodom.

While he stood there he was startled by the sound of a thick voice
behind him. It was Israel's voice. He was speaking to Naomi. "Yes," he
was saying, "it is hard to part. We were going to be very happy. . . .
But you must not cry. Listen! When I am there--eh? you know, _there_--I
will want to say, 'Father, you did well to hear my prayer. My little
daughter--she is happy, she is merry, and her soul is all sunshine.'
So you must not weep. Never, never, never! Remember! . . . . Ah! that's
right, that's right. My simple-hearted darling! My sunny, merry, happy
girl!"

Naomi was trying to laugh in obedience to her father's will. She
was combing his white beard with her fingers--it was knotted and
tangled--and he was labouring hard to speak again.

"Naomi, do you remember?" he said; and then